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Environmental Group Calls for Fracking Ban in New Report

SAN FRANCISCO, CA - MAY 30: A protestor holds a sign during a demonstration against fracking in California outside of the Hiram W. Johnson State Office Building on May 30, 2013 in San Francisco, California. Dozens of protesters with the group Californians Against Fracking staged a protest outside of California Gov. Jerry Brown's San Francisco offices demanding that Gov. Brown ban fracking in the state.

En­vir­on­ment Amer­ica, a group of state-based en­vir­on­ment­al ad­vocacy or­gan­iz­a­tions, re­leased a re­port Thursday called “Frack­ing by the Num­bers,” which quan­ti­fies dam­age done by frack­ing across the United States.

Ac­cord­ing to the re­port, frack­ing op­er­a­tions in the U.S. gen­er­ated 280 bil­lion gal­lons of tox­ic waste wa­ter in 2012. The re­port also found that, since 2005, frack­ing has used 250 bil­lion gal­lons of fresh wa­ter, de­graded 360,000 acres, and re­leased 100 mil­lion met­ric tons of glob­al warm­ing pol­lut­ants in­to the at­mo­sphere.

In Au­gust, the In­teri­or De­part­ment’s Bur­eau of Land Man­age­ment ended the pub­lic com­ment peri­od on a pro­posed rule to reg­u­late frack­ing on fed­er­al and In­di­an lands. BLM has not yet said when it ex­pects to fi­nal­ize the rule.

Dur­ing a phone call with re­port­ers, however, John Rumpler, a seni­or at­tor­ney for En­vir­on­ment Amer­ica, said that the reg­u­la­tions are not enough. In­stead, he said, the ad­min­is­tra­tion should ban hy­draul­ic frac­tur­ing al­to­geth­er.

“The num­bers on frack­ing add up to an en­vir­on­ment­al night­mare. Con­struct­ing a reg­u­lat­ory re­gime suf­fi­cient to pro­tect our wa­ter and our health … seems im­plaus­ible at best,” Rumpler said, adding: “At the end of the day, pro­tect­ing our en­vir­on­ment and pub­lic health will re­quire a ban on frack­ing.”

Katie Brown, a spokes­per­son for En­ergy in Depth, a pro-oil and gas-drilling group, called the find­ings base­less. “En­vir­on­ment Amer­ica’s latest re­port simply re­pack­ages tired and thor­oughly de­bunked claims. The ac­tu­al num­bers show that nat­ur­al gas and hy­draul­ic frac­tur­ing are slash­ing air pol­lu­tion, rap­idly re­du­cing green­house gases, and cre­at­ing hun­dreds of thou­sands of jobs,” she said in a state­ment.

"Chuck Rosenberg, the acting head of the Drug Enforcement Agency who has found himself and his agency at odds with the Trump administration in recent months, told staff members Tuesday that he is planning to step down from his post." The Obama administration holdover will step down on October 1.

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HAD BEGUN TO PUBLICLY CRITICIZE TRUMP

Sen. Corker to Retire

1 hours ago

THE DETAILS

Another Republican member of Congress is showing himself out the door. After much thought, consideration and family discussion over the past year, Elizabeth and I have decided that I will leave the United States Senate when my term expires at the end of 2018,” said Sen. Bob Corker in a statement. The Tennessean has served since 2006.

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NOT ILLEGAL, BUT MUST BE FORWARDED TO WORK ACCOUNTS

At Least 6 WH Advisors Used Private Email Accounts

1 hours ago

THE LATEST

Jared Kushner, Stephen Bannon, Reince Priebus, Gary Cohn, Stephen Miller, and Ivanka Trump sent or received some emails on personal accounts that related to White House business. "Officials are supposed to use government emails for their official duties so their conversations are available to the public and those conducting oversight. But it is not illegal for White House officials to use private email accounts as long as they forward work-related messages to their work accounts so they can be preserved."

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SAYS CONTACTS WERE “BENIGN”

Stone Releases Correspondence with Guccifer 2.0

1 hours ago

THE LATEST

"Roger Stone, a longtime friend and adviser to Donald Trump, released correspondence Tuesday" with the online hacker known as Guccifer 2.0 , which "U.S. intelligence agencies said was used by Russian government-linked entities to distribute embarrassing information about Democrats during the 2016 election. The disclosures came in a 47-page opening statement made available to reporters in advance of Mr. Stone’s Tuesday appearance in front of the House Intelligence Committee." Stone called his contacts with Guccifer "limited" and "benign."

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PRIEBUS, SPICER, HICKS, MCGAHAN

Mueller Could Start Interviewing White House Figures This Week

1 hours ago

THE LATEST

"Special counsel investigators could start interviewing current and former White House staff as soon as later this week regarding the Russian probe, two sources familiar with the matter tell CNN. One source cautioned it is still being worked out with Robert Mueller's office and said it might be delayed until next week." Among those who could have a sit-down with the special prosecutor: former chief of staff Reince Priebus, former press secretary Sean Spicer, communications director Hope Hicks, White House counsel Don McGahn, communications adviser Josh Raffel and associate counsel James Burnham.